


I Will Fall To Get Back Up

by DefaltManifesto



Category: Black Jewels - Anne Bishop
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hypersexuality, Multiple Personalities, Past Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Sexual Abuse, Past incest abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape Recovery, Reconciliation, Victims Abusing Victims
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-23
Packaged: 2019-02-06 04:09:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12809313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DefaltManifesto/pseuds/DefaltManifesto
Summary: Without the threat of death hanging over their heads, Daemon, Lucivar, and Saetan come to terms with their shared histories.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Important notes:
> 
> There's no incest in this fic outside referenced canonical incest abuse between Daemon and Hespabah and Daemon and Lucivar. This fic deals with some really difficult topics and grapples with how to reconcile past abuse at one another's hands when they are both being abused. Obviously some of this may come off as abuse apology and that is not my intent. This is about two people trying to rebuild their relationship now that they are no longer stuck in an abusive situation. Tread lightly if you think this could be triggering. I tagged for as much as I could but if you think there needs to be another tag, let me know. Also, I tagged multiple personalities because that's as close as I can get to a term describing Daemon's relationship with The Sadist. I realize this isn't entirely accurate. 
> 
> Thank you to Nuanta for reading this over even though she had not read the books and instead had to listen to my yell forever about how I really needed to write this fic and it was really hard and difficult. Love you! Thank you to Sublimediscordance for letting me text him screenshots of my writing in either frustration or excitement. There's three total chapters. The first is Lucivar, then Daemon, then Saetan.

[The tumblr](http://schizzar.tumblr.com)

 

Lucivar notices things others don’t and when he does, he usually mentions it right away. With Daemon though, he’s always bided his time because things were so often not what they seemed. When Saetan comes to him though, Lucivar realizes it’s time to step in.           

“I’m just not sure he’s even aware of what he’s doing,” Saetan says as they sit across from one another in Lucivar’s kitchen. “And that scares me.”

Lucivar mulls over the words. Daemon intentionally does a lot of things, in fact he sees every move as a carefully calculated move in a chess game where no one else can even see the board. He’s dangerous enough as it is. For Daemon to not be aware of how his actions are perceived? That’s an even more deadly game even if it hasn’t become one yet.

“And it was Winsol that he did this?” Lucivar’s stomach turns. Daemon, in bed with Saetan and caressing him like a lover. Like Saetan wasn’t his father. It hadn’t gone anywhere but that doesn’t mean it couldn’t have, not when you had the seductive creature that existed between Daemon and The Sadist lounging in your bed.

"Yes. At first I didn’t think much of it,” Saetan says. “That predatory part of him will always exist and will always have a sexual edge to it. But…it’s not right. It’s not good for him.”

Lucivar gets up and begins to pace. “Did I ever tell you about the night Daemon mutilated that Queen so horribly he was nearly exiled?”

Saetan frowns and shakes his head.

Lucivar swallows around the lump in his threat. “He kissed me then, grabbed me, and offered himself to me like some prize just before he did it. I turned him down and that’s when he went to her bed. I thought it was just The Sadist in him playing games but maybe…maybe it was some sort of begging for help. Like he wanted me to stop him or give him a reason not to.”

Saetan curses under his breath and Lucivar almost regrets saying anything at all when he sees the pain his eyes; the self-loathing.

“What happened to us is not your fault,” Lucivar says, stepping towards him. “You did not create The Sadist, father, and you did not destroy his ability to understand intimacy without sexuality.”

“Perhaps not. But I should’ve noticed something was wrong,” Saetan says.

Lucivar scoffs. “Daemon and I have enough issues it’s hard to hold it against you that you didn’t pick out every single one.”

“I’m your father,” Saetan says.

“And you’re a great one,” Lucivar says, kneeling before him and holding his father’s hands in his own. “You have brought this family together and helped us heal. You can’t hold yourself accountable for what Dorothea did.”

“I know…I know. But we’re going to help him now,” Saetan says. There’s a wary look in his eyes when he looks at Lucivar.

Forcing Daemon to admit something was wrong, and then getting him to accept help, would be dangerous. He had healed a lot the last few years. Push too hard though and there was a chance it’d be too much. But they couldn’t let it continue.

 

 

-.-

 

Daemon stands at the window overlooking Marian’s vegetable garden. Lucivar can read the apprehension in his stance which means Daemon knows he didn’t call him for a visit for a pleasant chat, not that he’d been hiding it. Marian had taken Jaenelle and Daemonar into town after all.

“What is it then?” Daemon asks.

“Can’t I want to spend an afternoon with my brother?”

“If that’s all it was, you wouldn’t look like you were scared of me,” Daemon says, voice soft as he turns towards him, hands in his pockets.

“It’s about…a few things,” Lucivar says. “Trends Saetan and I have noticed.”

He can tell that’s not what Daemon expected to hear by the brief look of confusion in his golden eyes that’s quickly masked again.

“You’re not one to beat around the bush. What is it Lucivar?” Daemon asks.

“Remember that night you mutilated the Queen?” Lucivar asks.

Daemon raises an eyebrow. “Which one?”

“The one where you tried to take me to bed beforehand,” Lucivar says, calling forth the Ebony shield from the Ring of Honor as he does so.

He’s glad he did.

The Black-Jeweled rage that washes through the room can only be a harbinger for whatever violence Daemon wants to enact in response to the memories Lucivar has stirred up. Daemon crosses the room in a few quick strides. His lips curl into a snarl when he realizes he can’t get through the Ebony shield.

“Daemon-“

Daemon punches the shield with his power before dropping to his knees, cradling his hand to his chest as he gasps. Lucivar frowns and kneels.

“Well that was stupid. You know you can’t get through this,” Lucivar says.

“I’m sorry,” Daemon says. “I never should have…I forgot…”

It could be a trick. Daemon is angry to trick him long enough to kill him, but his gut says more than anything Daemon is hurting. He lets the shield fall and reaches out. Daemon flinches, skittering back until he’s sitting on the ground, head bowed.

“Daemon,” Lucivar says. “I am sorry for bringing it up but I had to.”

“How could you have stood being around me all these years?” Daemon asks.

“Because you were hurting. Darkness knows I’ve done my fair share of harm to you when I was hurting as well,” Lucivar says. “But Daemon, I bring it up because of this past Winsol.”

Daemon looks up. “I haven’t…” His face twists into an expression of pain. “Father.”

“Saetan and I have begun to wonder if perhaps you have trouble expressing intimacy in a…normal way,” Lucivar says.

“Perhaps I do,” Daemon says. He looks like he wants to be sick. “It seems obvious now that you’ve drawn my attention to it.”

"We don’t hate you, Daemon,” Lucivar says. “Do you remember what you said to me that night? When I pushed you away?”

"I…” He shakes his head. “I remember kissing you, touching you, but the rest is…”

“You told me you couldn’t stand being touched by them anymore,” Lucivar says. “You tried to take me to bed because you were chasing some sort of comfort and damn it, Daemon I would’ve held you. It didn’t have to be…”

“I’m sorry for putting you in that position then, Lucivar. And I’ll apologize to Saetan. I’m not going to let this happen again,” Daemon says. “You have to understand that.”

“Daemon, I know,” Lucivar says. He shifts closer, grabbing Daemon’s hands. “We’re not looking for apologies. We just want to help you see that not everything has to be like it was then.”

“I know that,” Daemon says, a sharper edge entering his eyes. “My life now is nothing like it was then.”

“But what happened to us, Daemon, that’s going to affect us for the rest of our lives,” Lucivar says. “You never learned how to interact with people without it being a seduction but you have to learn how now.”

"You took to it just fine,” Daemon says, tugging his hands out of Lucivar’s grasp. “You never made a move towards me, towards Saetan, towards Surreal, or Rainier. The thought never entered your head.”

Lucivar closes his eyes. “That’s because it was different for us. Dorothea started training you years before she got to me.” _Too young._

“Does Jaenelle know?” Daemon asks. He’s staring at his lap again.

“Probably,” Lucivar says. “Knowing her, knowing how she put you back together again in the first place…but it can’t hurt to ask.”

Daemon squeezes his eyes shut tight and draws his knees up, folding his arms across them and burying his head in them like a child would. It makes Lucivar’s heart ache. “How can she still love me when I’m this tainted?”

There’s a vulnerability in his voice that Lucivar can’t remember ever hearing, or rather, he can only recall hearing it once; the day he’d held his brother as he sobbed in his arms as he finally came to grips with what they had thought was Jaenelle’s death. Lucivar reaches out and pulls Daemon into a tight hug, half into his lap. Daemon resists at first, but it’s just a weak push of his hands at Lucivar’s arms before he succumbs and lets out something like a dry sob against his neck.

“You’re not, Daemon,” Lucivar says, clutching the back of Daemon’s head and holding him close. “Jaenelle destroyed that corruption, and she knows who and what you are better than any of us and she loves you. But you have to heal from this, truly heal. If you don’t, you’re just going to make the same mistakes.”

Daemon laughs, a pitiful sound. “If only I knew how.”

“We’ll figure it out together, Daemon,” Lucivar says. “You, me, Jaenelle, and Saetan. We’re going to fix this part of you that Dorothea destroyed, I promise you that.”

Daemon doesn’t say another word. Instead, he just lets Lucivar hold him.

 

-.-

 

Lucivar fills Jaenelle in on the barebones of what’s going on at Daemon’s request. Of course, Daemon will talk to her but he’s too out of sorts when he returns to their home so Lucivar speaks with her over coffee and nutcakes in Daemon’s study. Jaenelle sits, silent, when Lucivar finishes.

“We love him,” he says. “It’s why we had to bring it to his attention, even if it hurt him to do so.”

“I know who and what Daemon is,” Jaenelle says, stirring her coffee as she thinks. “When I put his chalice back together, I saw everything he’d done and I saw how The Sadist influenced Daemon and how Daemon influenced The Sadist. Not even I can purge that portion of him away and I wouldn’t even if I could. There is a natural way to heal and I’d have that for him any day over a surgical removal of a piece of his core.”

"Nothing will ever get rid of that side of him,” Lucivar says.

“And you shouldn’t want it to,” Jaenelle says, voice sharp. “That part of him can’t ever leave because it is what will protect you all when you need it, and it is what keeps him sane.”

"What do you mean?” Lucivar asks. How could having that sort of cruelty keep a man sane?

“As long as he has that side, he knows he has control. And control when you’ve spent the whole of your life being out of it is essential to healing,” Jaenelle says. “Just because he’s not using it doesn’t mean it’s not there and knowing that he can draw on it if he needs is crucial. You have something like that to rely on too.”

Lucivar ducks his head. He remembers the killing fields he’s stepped onto, the one he stepped onto not too long ago to keep his own territory safe, and in all honesty, knowing that it was an option did even out his temper. It was still explosive, still deadly, but it was easier to contain and control.

"You can’t help him heal if you hold a grudge against the part of himself that he created to protect those he loves even if it meant hurting them,” Jaenelle says.

“I don’t,” Lucivar says, looking up. It’s hard to maintain that declaration when he meets her eyes and sees Witch looking back at him. “I forgave that debt.”

“But he still hurt you, degraded you, and tore your heart open,” Jaenelle says. “I understand why you resent that part of him, but don’t you dare let him think that you do. If you must direct your anger at someone, direct it at me. I knew what he would do when I ordered him to buy me more time.”

Lucivar stands, the air suddenly feeling too thick to breath. “I need to see Daemon.”

Jaenelle nods. “He’ll be in our bedroom. I’ll join you later.”

Lucivar all but flees. He refuses to be angry with Jaenelle or Daemon for doing what they had to when it came to rooting out the corruption that had threatened to poison the Realms. For an Eyrien Warlord Prince, forgiving that sort of trauma is…he’s not sure what it is. It’s certainly not healthy, but it’s more than that. It’s like a poison in his bones that he can’t purge. He can’t hurt Daemon or Jaenelle, can’t get vengeance for the wounds on his heart and his mind, so that leaves what?

He knocks on the door. The Black lock dissolves and he opens it. Daemon is under the covers of the bed, back to the door. Lucivar spells another lock on the door and crosses the room to stand at the other end of the bed, debating his warring needs to punch Daemon in the face and hold him close thanks to the memories Jaenelle stirred within him. In the end, he settles for crawling under the covers and stretching out on his back.

“What’s wrong?” Daemon asks, voice muffled from where he has his head turned halfway into his pillow.

"I was thinking about the camp,” Lucivar says. “I wanted to be near you.”

Daemon makes an odd noise that Lucivar can’t hope to label. “I’m not sure why thinking of those days makes you want to be near me.”

“I don’t know either,” Lucivar says. He stares at the dark ceiling. Jaenelle had stirred up the memories for a reason, urging him to confront something he’d been avoiding since he was making Daemon confront his own demons. “Go back to sleep.”

Daemon goes silent. Lucivar doesn’t know if he actually falls asleep. Eventually though, his own eyes droop shut and he lets sleep take him.

 

-.-

 

Lucivar wakes up with Daemon’s arm slung over his hips and his face mashed up against Lucivar’s shoulder. Jaenelle is on his other side with her back to them both. He reaches his hand up, fingers combing through Daemon’s hair in a light touch that makes him waken and push himself upright. There’s a guarded look in his eyes. Lucivar regrets, a little bit, being the one to put it there.

“I’m sorry,” Lucivar says.

“For what?” Daemon asks.

“For still holding what you did to me against you,” Lucivar says.

“That debt was forgiven,” Daemon says, but there’s a vulnerability to his voice that betrays him.

"Yes, it was, but a part of me hates The Sadist inside you still,” Lucivar says. “And I can’t do that. Not if I’m going to be your brother.”

Daemon closes his eyes as he sits back on his heels, sheets pooling at the base of his spine. “The Sadist doesn’t exist to be loved.”

“Maybe not,” Lucivar says, then offers a strained smile. “But he protects us and you. So…”

“All I ever do is cause you pain,” Daemon says. He moves like he’s going to leave but Jaenelle turns and grabs his wrist.

“Stay. And talk,” she says. She glances between them both and then releases Daemon before flopping on her side.

“I hurt you and Saetan in that camp and sure it wasn’t intentional, but I’ve hurt you recently too,” Daemon says. “I can’t keep The Sadist leashed even when I try.”

“That’s because Dorothea twisted up you too,” Lucivar says. “And Hepsabah. When your own adopted mother tries to fuck you, how the hell are you supposed to learn proper boundaries?”

Daemon hisses out a harsh breath between his teeth. “I should know better.”

“Yeah, maybe, and now you definitely do, so stop dwelling on it,” Lucivar says. “I’m not losing you over this, and I’m not losing you over my inability to understand that The Sadist is a part of you. You’re too damn important for that.”

Daemon’s eyes narrow, lips curling. “You want me to just forget that I sexually assaulted you?”

"Yes,” Lucivar says. “And then I want you to work on your boundaries because that’s going to prevent it from happening again.”

Daemon stares at him and Lucivar meets his eyes as steadily as he can. He’s not going to let Daemon doubt him.

“Alright,” Daemon says. “But how do you propose we do that?”

Lucivar shrugs. “I have no idea.”

“Snarly males,” Jaenelle grumbles into her pillow.


	2. Chapter 2

[The tumblr](http://schizzar.tumblr.com)

 

The idea that he’s hurt someone he cares about eats at Daemon’s insides. It’s still a somewhat foreign feeling. Delighting in the harm and damage he’d done to those who’d hurt him, violated him, and done worse to others was common, but the debts between himself and Lucivar and Saetan were long buried and forgiven. There was no joy to be had in hurting them or even causing them to be uncomfortable.

It takes work. Gentle nudges when his hands wander, sharp looks when the seduction magic that so easily enters his voice washes over Saetan or Lucivar. It tears him up when he’s alone, knowing that The Sadist lurks so close to the surface. To think he’d been scared he’d lose that edge. He couldn’t even get _away_ from it. He begins to fear his own touch. Jaenelle notices but unlike before, when she thought he no longer desired her, she makes a point of cuddling up to him in the quiet moments they steal together during the day.

She doesn’t push him to talk. No one does. That almost eats him up more. They want his behavior to be better but they don’t seem all that interested in what’s going on in his head. Or maybe that’s not entirely fair. Perhaps they’re giving him space and letting him come to them when he’s ready. He’s not sure when it got so hard to read people, but he’s been off balance since the first time Lucivar brought the matter up.

“Well you could always talk to them,” Rainier says, flipping through a few papers and frowning as he studies one of them.

“It’s not that simple,” Daemon says from where he lounges in one of the study chairs across from Rainier’s desk.

“It really is,” Rainier says. “Especially with your brother. If talking doesn’t work you could always spar with him.” Rainier winces and Daemon watches as his hand twitches as if to rub at his old injury.

“I think that would just make us both angry,” Daemon says.

“Talking it is then,” Rainier says. “Do you know why Mrs. Beale ordered more food this month? Was there an event I wasn’t made aware of?”

Daemon frowns. “No. I’ll speak with Jaenelle. Otherwise Mrs. Beale gets what she wants.”

“Of course,” Rainier says. He sets his pile of documents aside. “So if I’m understanding this all right, you want them to initiate the discussion because otherwise it’s a sign that they don’t actually care about your wellbeing.”

When it’s out so frankly, it makes him angry. It sounds…childish. That’s all the more frustrating and humiliating, but he doesn’t lash out at Rainier given that he’s the last person to deserve it.

“Can I speak candidly on this?” Rainier asks.

“You already are,” Daemon says, tone dry.

It speaks to Rainier’s trust in him that instead of flinching he just raises an eyebrow in response.

"You’re feeling sorry for yourself and you’re behaving as I did when I first realized I’d never dance again,” Rainier says. “You’re wallowing. All of your anxiety can be dealt with if you just talk to your family. Stop finding excuses for why they need to reach out to you first when you know as well as I do that they’re waiting on you.”

Daemon bows his head. Rainier is, of course, right. But that’s not the only issue. “If we talk, Lucivar is going to lie again.”

"Again?”

He looks up. “Lucivar said he’s forgiven me for those three days in Dorothea’s camp and for my…behavior back when we were slaves. But he hasn’t. I can see it in his eyes.”

“Ah.” Rainier shakes his head. “Now that is an issue you two will have to settle. That matter is too complicated.”

“What do you mean?”

He’s curious to see what his and Lucivar’s relationship looks like to an outsider, someone who wasn’t present for the centuries worth of dancing and hurting and comforting and torturing.

"You betrayed him, Daemon, and even if you’re intentions were pure…Surreal has nightmares about those days still,” Rainier says. “But you’re family, and he’s hurt you plenty too. How you find forgiveness when you have that sort of baggage is something I’m not sure of, and I don’t envy your position.”

“Do you think I’m a bad person, Rainier? Do you trust me not to hurt you?” Daemon asks.

Rainier shrugs. “I trust that I’ve done nothing to earn your anger.”

Daemon gets to his feet, anger rising quick and hot again. “I wouldn’t.”

“Even if I betrayed you? If I hurt Surreal? Jaenelle?”

“If you tried to harm them, yes, but that’s not the same,” Daemon says.

“It is when no one knows where that line is,” Rainier says, voice calm even when Daemon turns to look at him. “You don’t do an eye for an eye, Daemon. If someone hurts someone you love, you return the gesture tenfold and don’t pretend that you only take what is needed to satisfy a debt.”

The idea burns his insides. “Do you really feel like you must walk on eggshells around me?”

“No, nothing quite that bad,” Rainier says. “And I know Lucivar feels it less so than the rest of us. If Surreal and I were truly afraid of you, we would leave, and she did for a while after that night when she tried to-“       

“Violate me?” Daemon asks.            

“Yes,” Rainier says. “Again. You give back tenfold what someone does to you. But we all know where we stand with you. The only difference between you and any other Warlord Prince we might have conflict with is there are things you can do that the majority wouldn’t dream of. I know there’s nothing I would do that would violate your trust. But the instinctive part of me? The Opal Warlord Prince? He is scared, even if I’m not. That’s not enough for me to want to leave your side, and it’s certainly not enough for Lucivar to leave yours, but I meant what I said when I told you it’s something you’re going to have to deal with.” He shakes his head. “You forget your own power.”

“Yes. I suppose I do.”

"One more thing though, Daemon,” Rainier says. “I told you I trust myself not to do anything to earn your anger. So did Lucivar before that day. He did nothing wrong and you turned that monster inside of you on him. It’s something to keep in mind.”

Daemon leaves before he lashes out. It’s not like Rainier said anything that was incorrect. No matter what, Daemon always held power over anyone he held a conversation with and that inherent power dynamic, that inherent fear, would color every interaction. That had never bothered him before. But then, he’d never turned his full power on someone he loved until those three days in Dorothea’s camp. He’s never felt that difference in power as keenly as he does now, especially when The Sadist still lurks so close to the surface even if it barely held any influence.

Which means his only option was to talk with Lucivar and really sort out what the problem was and why Lucivar couldn’t forgive him for his betrayal.

 

-.-

 

Lucivar looks like a caged tiger as he strides across the open path near his home. Seeing the tension, Daemon regrets wishing even for a moment that Lucivar would spare a thought for Daemon’s feelings after their conversation a few weeks ago. Looking at him now, it’s obvious that’s all he’s thought of. In typical Lucivar fashion, he’d put his brother first. Daemon jogs to catch up with him. He has to choose his next words carefully if he wants something productive to come out of this, and he’s only ever been good at choosing the words to make things worse.

“This isn’t exactly a relaxing morning stroll,” Daemon says once he catches up. “What’s wrong?”

His eyes flick down and watch as Lucivar’s fingers begin to curl before relaxing. If he needed proof that Lucivar was hiding something, he had it. After all, Lucivar didn’t have the head or stomach for mind games, preferring the more direct approach of crushing whatever was a threat. Daemon’s first reaction was anger. His second is a rush of guilt as he realizes that he’s the reason Lucivar’s repressing himself.

“How dare you,” Daemon says, knowing those were the words to bring Lucivar’s anger to the forefront. “Are you hiding how you feel because you think I can’t handle it?”

Lucivar whirls and grabs the front of Daemon’s coat, wings curling around them in an instinctive display of dominance that Daemon meets with a relaxed smile.

“You entitled _bitch_ ,” Lucivar hisses out.

"I didn’t ask you to treat me like a broken witch,” Daemon shoots back. “How do we settle this if you’re not going to be honest?”

“There’s nothing to settle,” Lucivar says as he shoves Daemon away. His eyes dart to the side before he turns his back.

“You must be losing your touch,” Daemon says. “That was far from convincing.”

"What would you have me do?” Lucivar shouts the words but doesn’t turn back around, apparently only capable of being honest when he can’t see Daemon.

"Be honest. That would be a start,” Daemon says. “Pretending you’ve forgiven me when you haven’t isn’t helping either of us.”

“I forgave that debt-“

“And maybe you shouldn’t have!”

The words hung between them. Protocol exists for a reason and debts and their subsequent payment or forgiveness functioned as a way to keep Warlord Princes from shedding blood. And now, he’s spitting in the face of Lucivar’s forgiveness.

“What sort of punishment then? If not forgiveness, what do you deserve?” Lucivar asks.

Daemon stifles a noise of frustration. “I don’t know, that’s your job. All I know is no one is moving past this until you do something. You can’t forgive me until then. If you could, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

Lucivar finally turns to face him. His gaze is haunted. There’s no other word for the look Daemon sees there. “I’m not you, Daemon. I can’t return the damage. I don’t want to.”

Daemon steps forward, a dangerous feeling expanding in his chest; desperation. “If I were anyone else, what would you do?”

“They’d be dead,” Lucivar says. “But I couldn’t kill you even if I wanted to.”

“So what next?” Daemon asks. “You stay angry forever and this lies between us? You live in fear of me?”

Daemon definitely gives Rainier credit. The words are spot on and Lucivar flinches when he hears them.

“Daemon…”

 It’s all connected, isn’t it?” Daemon asks. “You come to me about my _boundaries_ , about my inability to keep my hands to myself, about…trying to seduce you because I had no one else to trust, but it’s all because you’re scared that I could do that to you, isn’t it? You’re scared that I’ll do to you what those corrupt bitches did.”

It makes sense when he says it. There used to at least be Protocol to stand between them, an understanding of debt and payment. But Daemon shattered that when he turned on them with no warning, instead just violating the formal forgiveness they’d given each other and reopening old wounds alongside new ones. Now, there’s no trust. No Protocol. There’s nothing for Lucivar to fall back on.

“I’m sorry,” Lucivar says, voice cracking on the last syllable. “I wish I could trust you. I love you, Daemon, you have to understand that, but I don’t trust you. I can’t.”

Daemon nods. He gets it. Even if he hates it, hates himself for causing Lucivar pain and hates Jaenelle for ordering him to do it and hates Dorothea for putting Jaenelle in that position…he gets it. “I wouldn’t, for the record. I wouldn’t do what they did.” Daemon steps away, wanting nothing more than to be alone. “I would never do that to you Lucivar.”

Lucivar doesn’t have to say it, not when they’re both thinking it.

_You already did._


	3. Chapter 3

[The Tumblr](http://schizzar.tumblr.com)

 

Saetan likes to think of himself as a good father, at least now. Darkness knows he has enough sins when it comes to the days his sons were taken from him, but now, with Lucivar pacing before him he feels doubt where he’d begun to feel security. The hurt and trauma his sons endured because of his inaction and inability to save them left them both with scars that still effect their lives. He can’t undo that. All he can try to do is help them muddle through it on their own but even that is a challenge because he can’t truly know what they went through.

He lets Lucivar pace a little more. Lucivar doesn’t often think before he speaks, which means whatever is on his mind now probably requires more delicate wording. There’s few things Lucivar gives that courtesy too.

“What did Daemon do?” Saetan asks, leaning forward on his desk as he fixes Lucivar with a hard look.

“He rejected my forgiveness.”

The words weren’t shouted. They leave Lucivar’s lips in a quiet voice and hang in the air between them, hiding the severity of their meaning in the calm tone with which they were delivered.

“I see,” Saetan says. “There isn’t really Protocol for a situation like this.”

“That’s not the problem,” Lucivar says. He looks down, wings drawing in tight. “The problem is he was right to do so. I haven’t truly forgiven him.

Saetan keeps his expression neutral. Leave it to his sons to violate Protocol in ways no one else would think to do so. “Why haven’t you?”

Lucivar looks up at him. “You have?”

“Yes, Lucivar, I have,” Saetan says. He leans back in his chair, feeling his age more than he has in a while as Lucivar folds himself into the seat opposite of him. “And you haven’t.”

“How do you forgive someone when you don’t trust them?” Lucivar asks.

Saetan closes his eyes and turns his face up to the ceiling as he thinks. Perhaps things are more broken between his sons than he’d even realized if Lucivar and Daemon still couldn’t feel as though they could trust each other. “Do you fear him?”

“Yes. Of course I do. Don’t you?”

He can’t help but laugh as he shifts to look at Lucivar. “Certainly, but that doesn’t mean I don’t trust him not to hurt me. Can he? Yes. Will he?” Saetan shakes his head. “No. He won’t.”

Lucivar’s right hand curls into a fist where it rests on the desk and when he speaks, his voice cracks. “How can you be so sure?”

“Daemon would never willingly harm you or I, not unless we went after him first,” Saetan says. “And there’s no longer anyone in this world powerful enough to compel him to do so against his will.”

Lucivar tears himself away from the seat and begins to pace again. “He turned on us-“

“On Jaenelle’s orders,” Saetan says, getting to his feet. He grits his teeth and grabs his cane as he moves over him. “On Jaenelle’s orders to stall for time and to keep Dorothea and Hekatah from doing worse to us.”

"Nothing is worse than dancing with The Sadist,” Lucivar snarls.

“So you’d prefer to be dead?”

Lucivar recoils, his temporary anger dying away. “I-“

“Because if it weren’t for Daemon, I would have died and your family? You think Dorothea wouldn’t have tortured and killed them before you?” Saetan asks.

Lucivar’s expression contorts into something like pain and anger and sadness all at once. Saetan’s seen the same look in the mirror.

“Lucivar, listen to me,” Saetan says, reaching out and grasping his shoulder with his good hand. “What Daemon did haunts us both. But you can’t treat it as though he was any more in control of the situation than you were.”

“Then what do I do?”

“About what?” Saetan asks.

“The anger.”

There’s so much of himself in his sons. He wishes that weren’t so. It’s hard to see that anger twisted up with the desire not to lash out at anyone who didn’t deserve it coiling inside someone else, someone he cared about.

“You have to let it go,” Saetan says, holding Lucivar’s gaze. “Otherwise it eats you up and turns you into something you’re not and should never be. You can’t take it out on Daemon. Or Jaenelle. Dorothea and Hekatah are dead. There is no one left who deserves that wrath Lucivar so you must let it go or you will never trust your brother again.”

He’s not expecting tears. His sons have been moved to tears rarely, but perhaps he underestimated how deeply his sons loved one another and how much it hurt them to have an open and festering wound keeping them apart. Lucivar closes his eyes and weeps, leaning into Saetan’s arms. Saetan leans back against the desk and holds him close, ignoring the pain in his chest at what he’s let happen to his family. He’d do anything to prevent his family from having to fight the same internal demons he did. He’d carried the anger of losing them for years. There’d been plenty of blame to go around, plenty of targets, but none of them he could hit when the world was still fragile and teetering on the edge of war.

He’d sequestered himself away for thousands of years to keep himself from wreaking havoc on the world and did it to himself instead. Without Jaenelle’s foretold coming, and without her there to help him heal he would’ve burned up in his own anger long ago and done things that made him recoil now simply thinking about. And now, his son was in danger of succumbing to the same fate.

"How?” Lucivar chokes out against Saetan’s throat. “How do I let it go?”

“I don’t have that answer,” Saetan says. “I wish I did, but that’s something you two will have to decide.”

Lucivar doesn’t leave right away. Saetan holds him until he can stand on his own.

 

-.-

 

Saetan wishes, not for the first time, he had Andulvar around still. But no, he and Prothvar were nothing more but whispers in the Darkness now, leaving Saetan without anyone to speak with. There was no one else as ancient as he, save Lorn and that oversized lizard had never been helpful when it came to matters like this. Which left him alone in his study, twiddling a pen.

What was the point of his age when he didn’t have the answers his family needed to put themselves back together again? He’d never intended to live this long. He’d begun to make his peace with that. But now, knowing the rifts and old wounds that still plague his sons, how can he leave free of guilt? There were other things in his past that he’d long stopped feeling guilty over if only because he forgot them after several thousand years. This though…he could not let himself expire knowing his children were still in pain because of his inaction all those years ago because truly, the problems they now faced were his responsibility. Daemon wouldn’t have a monster inside him. Lucivar wouldn’t have suffered his faked betrayal.

But what could he do? He didn’t have the answers. Time healed all wounds, or at least most of them. Those it didn’t, time at least dulled the pain, but he had a feeling what laid between Daemon and Lucivar would only fester with time. Both of them were survivors too, and if push came to shove…well Daemon would win none of them doubted that but the world was wide enough for them both if they could forgive each other for what had happened.

Saetan’s lips twist into a snarl, but there’s no one to direct it towards. And what was a Warlord Prince without an enemy?

 

-.-

 

It’s not surprising that Daemon should come to him next. While many things between him and Lucivar are different, the recent years have made them similar in other respects, most noticeably the way they do their best to wear a track in the rug of Saetan’s study with their pacing. Saetan watches him, too tired to bother with his usual fake book reading.

“Lucivar and I talked,” Daemon says after a moment as he continues to pace.

“And I’m assuming it didn’t go well?”

Daemon expression is punched when he looks at Saetan. “It went fantastic. That’s the problem.”

He can’t help but laugh then. “So you and your brother have a productive conversation and your first instinct is to come to me?”

“I’ve gotten quite used to being able to lean on my father for emotional advice, yes,” Daemon says.

“Fair enough,” Saetan says. “So what was this conversation?”

“He said he was trying to let his anger go because he was starting to realize neither of us were at fault for what happened,” Daemon says. His expression morphs into something unreadable. “And maybe he’s right but that doesn’t help me.”

“I’m not following,” Saetan says.

From the look Daemon gives him, it’s obvious he’s lying and just trying to get Daemon say it out loud instead of letting assumption speak for him.

“I don’t forgiveness,” Daemon says. “I want what I’m due.”

“You think punishment will help you?” Saetan asks.

“It’s what I understand,” Daemon says.

“So you deserved every time you were whipped or caned or tortured?” Saetan asks, raising an eyebrow. He knows it isn’t true, knows that Daemon knows it isn’t. But he supposes on some level when even the tiniest infraction garnered a horrific punishment perhaps it was an instinct to need a punishment.

“Of course not but I…” Daemon shakes his head. “Even if he doesn’t think so this was my fault and I need to pay for it somehow.”

Saetan resists the urge to get up and shake his son by his shoulders. It’d hardly be productive.

“I’ll tell you what I told Lucivar,” Saetan says. “It wasn’t your fault, just like your difficulty with understanding appropriate boundaries between a father and son was not your fault. Punishing you for something you had no control over would make your brother no different than Dorothea. Maybe that’s not what you want to hear but it is true.”

Daemon lets out al augh that sounds more like a sigh and shakes his head as he begins to pace again. “I can’t accept that.”

“Why not?” Saetan can feel the energy building in Daemon and has half a mind to throw up a Black shield around the study just in case. He’s pushing Daemon, but Daemon needs to be pushed. And he’s the only one who can survive the fallout.

“Because, you damned failure of a father, I cannot accept yet another period of my life that I had no control over!” Daemon crosses the distance to the desk, hands slamming down on the wood and making it shudder. “I can only take so much, do you understand that?”

Saetan ignores the insult. After all, Daemon’s wounds on the matter run deeper than he thought, and Saetan can’t begrudge him for shoving some of the blame on him. “Daemon, you were not in control of the vast majority of your life. Denying it won’t help you now.”

Rage fills the room and presses in on Saetan’s mind. He braces for _something_ but all at once the energy leaves, sucking inward and vanishing. When he looks at Daemon, he’s crumpled into one of the chairs, head bowed as he leans forward on his knees. Saetan waits but Daemon doesn’t move. After a moment of hesitation, he gets up and approaches him, not stopping until he’s standing before him. It takes more effort than he cares to admit to get down on one knee so he’s at eye level.

“Daemon,” he says, taking his son’s hands in his own. “It wasn’t your fault. You weren’t in control then but you are now and how you choose to deal with your past is completely in your hands.”

Daemon sucks in a shuddering breath, hands trembling in Saetan’s grasp. “Do you trust me to make the right choice now?”

“Yes.”

He answers without hesitation not because it’s what Daemon needs to hear but because he knows it’s true. There’s a darkness that lurks in him. It lurks in all the Blood but it had been honed into a weapon within Daemon and that was never going away. But there was good in him and despite everything, Daemon’s personality bent towards something good.

“Daemon, I have faith that you will make the right choices from here on,” Saetan says, pressing his forehead to Daemon’s and closing his eyes. “I trust you more than you know.”

Daemon doesn’t speak but he doesn’t let go either.

 

-.-

 

Saetan doesn’t leave the Keep often. It’s a combination of the growing pain in his leg and back and the instinctive need to recoil from the living. That instinct grows every day. One day soon, he won’t be able to ignore it any longer. But Jaenelle requested his presence and he’s missed her dearly. She greets him at the door in ripped and dirty breeches with her hair in a messy bun on top of her head and a smile on her face.

“Papa, you made it sooner than I thought. Sorry for the mess,” she says.

“I grew used to your mucking about long ago, child,” he says, reaching out and tucking some hair back. “Why don’t you let me in?”

“Of course,” she says as she steps back to let him in. “I was out in the stables. I was thinking we could go for a ride out in the country if that was alright with you.”

“Just give me the nicest pony,” Saetan says.

Riding, with all his aches and pains, isn’t the most fun experience, but Jaenelle wouldn’t ask him to do anything without a reason. Just what her ulterior motive is though is beyond him. He waits in the stables with his non-Blood horse and feeds her carrots while he waits for Jaenelle to change. She joins him in a slightly cleaner version of what she’d greeted him with.

“You’re spoiling her,” she says, raising an eyebrow as Saetan feeds his mount one last carrot.   

“As if you don’t already.”

Riding through the city is less than pleasant and when they finally are free of the city gates, the growing tension in his chest releases. The crushing tension in his chest releases. The crushing weight of all those living people…he hates it. The open countryside tastes like heaven. The horse Jaenelle selected for him has an easy gait as well so all in all it’s more pleasant than he anticipated.

“I had an ulterior motive,” Jaenelle says, bringing her own mount to a slow walk as they head down a hill. 

“I figured,” Saetan says. “But I’m always willing to see you.”

Jaenelle smiles at him before looking ahead. “Cloak our presence. There’s something you need to see.”

“You’re taking me spying aren’t you?” he asks.

“Perhaps,” she says. “Just a peek is all, come on.”

He does as she orders, shielding their minds as they head up the next rise. She halts just before the crest and swings down from her mount before heading up on foot, leading her horse by the reins. Saetan follows her example and then freezes when he sees Lucivar and Daemon at the foot of the hill. They’re sitting on a blanket, their own mounts grazing nearby. He can’t make out the conversation from this distance, but it’s apparent from the way they look at each other and their body language that the conversation is intense and serious.

“What…”

“Twice a week they do this,” she says. “They come out and eat and talk. They’re learning how to be brothers again.”

“They’ve started over,” Saetan says.

Jaenelle takes his hand. “Yes. They have.”

He ducks his head, emotion welling up inside him and threatening to spill over. “I…”

“You did well, Papa,” she says. “Now come on. I brought nutcakes in my saddlebag and I didn’t drag you all the way out here just to watch them.”

He smiles at her. “I suppose not.”


End file.
